


Heart of Steel

by karatam



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Gen, Speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-03-01
Packaged: 2018-05-23 03:46:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6103780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karatam/pseuds/karatam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kara was different.</p><p>Alex could tell the instant she saw her sister, dressed in the all black Kryptonian military uniform (and with winged eyeliner that Kara never could manage, she usually ended up stabbing herself in the eye when she tried).</p><p>/</p><p>what if, while under the influence of the red Kryptonite, Kara found out that Alex was the one who killed Astra</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Kara was different.

Alex could tell the instant she saw her sister, dressed in the all black Kryptonian military uniform (and with winged eyeliner that Kara never could manage, she usually ended up stabbing herself in the eye when she tried).

Kara was different, not pulling her punches, smiling in a way that didn’t touch her eyes, making biting comments, and revelling in the pain of those around her.

It’s that last one that’s really came to the forefront with Alex.

“I know,” Kara said, stepping forward into the sunlight, ignoring everyone around her but Alex. “I know what you did.”

And Alex knew this moment would come, knew that she couldn’t (shouldn’t) keep a secret like this for long. She knew that it would fester between them like a never-healing wound Kara wouldn’t even know was there, bleeding onto Alex’s hands, tainting everything she touched.

She knew this moment would come, but oh how she had wished it never would.

“Kara, plea-” but she didn’t get another word out because suddenly Kara was there, hand on her throat and lifting her into the air (it felt eerily familiar). Both James and Winn leapt forward to help, but were lazily swatted away by Kara’s spare hand.

“Please, what?” Kara sneered. “Please don’t murder you, like you murdered my aunt? Like you murdered the last member of my _family_?” She snarled the last word and Alex could feel something withering in her chest.

Something must have showed on her face because suddenly Kara looked smug, her face clearing of anger and the corner of her mouth pulling upward.

“Oh, does that hurt?” Kara laughed, a sound utterly unfamiliar to Alex’s ears. “Remember that perfect world I came up with, the one where my whole family was still alive and Krypton wasn’t gone?” She paused, cocking her head to the side. “Remember how you weren’t there? Remember how I didn’t have a sister?”

Kara squeezed slightly, pushing Alex back against the wall, and Alex could feel her bones creaking at the pressure.

“My world was perfect without you in it, so why keep you around? All you do is murder the people I love. You kept me from being who I really am for _years_ , telling me to just be _normal_ , to just fit in. You took the last of my family away from me and I will _never_  forgive you for that.”

Alex tried to suck in a breath, tried to pry Kara’s fingers from her neck, but her sister (oh god, her little sister) just squeezed tighter, smirking when a tear dripped down Alex’s cheek.

Just when Alex was sure she would black out any second, the room exploded in sound and light as the fighting between the DEO and Non’s army spilled through the doorway. An anti-Kryptonian bullet ricocheted off the wall by Alex’s head and Kara flinched away, dropping Alex in the process. 

As Alex tried desperately to breath through her bruised throat, she looked up to see Hank wing Kara in the arm with a bullet, sending her flying through the now destroyed roof after her Kryptonian army.

“Alex!” James slipped an arm around her back, helping her up. “Are you okay?”

Alex just nodded.

“You know that wasn’t really her, right?” Winn piped up, “I mean, it was her, but not really _her_ , her.”

Hank watched her steadily with understanding eyes, but said nothing, just took her arm to transfer her weight from James to himself.

Tuning out James and Winn’s heated debate behind her, Alex touched her throat, noting the tender points and how her breathing was laboured and strained.

Kara had done that.

Kara had come within moments of killing her.

Kara had disowned her as family.

And the thing is, Alex thought, she’s pretty sure she deserved it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from Kay: all the things you didn't say, red kryptonite. Red!Kara lets Alex know of all the ways she failed and hurt Kara - from the kids stuff to the lying to Kara about the DEO for two years, to Astra - the things she's always held back because she needed Alex more than she needed apologies, but it still hurt.

Alex sags back against the cold bars, feeling the ragged edge of metal press into her shoulder blade. There’s no getting out of the cage, seeing as it was built to withstand the powers of an angry Kara.        

The click of heavy boots on stone echo up the hallway and Alex watches as Kara and Non enter the cave-like room, Non smirking over his niece’s (oh how Kara hates the fact that he’s related to her at all) shoulder. They come to a halt in front of the cage and Alex warily gets to her feet, wiping a smudge of blood from her nose and lifting her chin.

“So this is the famous Alex, then?” Non says, disdain dripping from her voice (Alex wants to punch him in the throat).

Kara’s face is still, emotionless, and so familiar, except that it isn’t. “This is Alex, the agent who killed my aunt.”

And then that face hardens, her jaw tensing and her eyebrows slanting down just a hint, before relaxing into a fake smile (it doesn’t sparkle and shine like Kara’s real smiles do).

“Remember when you ignored me for three straight weeks when I got here?” Kara takes a step to the side, clasping her hands behind her back and strolling in front of the cell. “Remember when I’d just watched my world disappear, showed up on a planet I’d never seen, and then you ignored me because you were _jealous_? Let kids at school make fun of the weird new kid who didn’t know what Harry Potter was, but somehow could do astrophysics in her head. You knew I couldn’t fight back and you just watched.”

“Kara-“ Alex says, her voice tripping over the lump in her throat. Because she had done that, she had ignored that scared little girl both at home and at school, turning away with a roll of her eyes when out of sight of her parents. She had been 14 and angry and stupid, and she’d give anything to take it back now. She remembers Kara scrambling under the table at the sound of popcorn and she wants to cry.

“And then!” Kara lets out a sound that might be laughter, harsh and grating. “And then you lied to me for years and actually spent your time hunting aliens, aliens like me.”

“No! Not like you, never like you!” She yells it, trying to get through to the real Kara, who must be in there somewhere, because if this is the real Kara now…Alex can’t even contemplate that.

“Just like me, Alex. Aliens who were ripped from their homelands and left on this forsaken planet to be hated and hunted by humans like you, you and your DEO,” Kara scoffs.

Alex knows what’s coming next, knows the accusation that she cannot stand against because she can never forgive herself for it.

“But you weren’t done yet, you had to _personally_ murder my aunt, my last real link to my family. And you didn’t even give her the honor of a soldier’s death, you stabbed her in the back and then lied to my _face_.” Kara’s face is a snarl, lip twisted up in an expression of hate that Alex has never seen. “You lied again and again and let me believe that you loved me, all the while hiding the fact that you’re nothing more than a murderer.”

It’s the Red Kryptonite, and she knows it, knows that Kara would never say any of these things, not with this kind of hatred and vitriol. But the memories are Kara’s, the emotions she’s drawing from are all real, and Alex’s chest is constricting because it’s like the air has been sucked from Alex’s lungs. She wants to respond and yell and cry and apologize every second for the rest of her life, but there’s nothing there. Nothing but emptiness and despair and fear that nothing between them will ever be the same

They’re inches apart with only the bars between then, but Alex has never felt so far away from her little sister.


End file.
